


Simmering

by juniper_and_lamplight



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Baking, Cunnilingus, Enthusiastic Consent, Established Relationship, F/F, Food fight as foreplay, Misuse of a tea towel, Porn with Feelings, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2021-02-16 12:15:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21507778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juniper_and_lamplight/pseuds/juniper_and_lamplight
Summary: Later, when they were collecting their discarded clothes from the kitchen floor and scrubbing drips of caramel off the countertops, Tina would accuse Farah of starting it.
Relationships: Farah Black/Tina Tevetino
Comments: 9
Kudos: 16





	Simmering

**Author's Note:**

> This is a follow-up to [ Light Work](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19009012), but you can read it as a standalone.  
> Thanks to [DontOffendTheBees](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DontOffendTheBees/pseuds/DontOffendTheBees) for much-needed encouragement and feedback, to Avian for the [case generator](https://perchance.org/khtet9imuf), and to RhondaHurley for declaring this the sweetest pornography she’d ever read.

Later, when they were collecting their discarded clothes from the kitchen floor and scrubbing stubborn drips of caramel off the countertops, Tina would accuse Farah of starting it. 

Farah, for her part, would neither confirm nor deny the accusation — at least not out loud. Privately, she would acknowledge that she’d engineered the situation with particular... _results_ in mind.

If pressed, however, Farah would insist that the true underlying blame rested on an overly generous apple orchard owner out in Snowhomish. The owner had been so grateful after Dirk, Farah, and Todd had stopped the orchard’s trees from rearranging themselves (the key had been to work _with_ the telekinetic wasps, not against them) that they’d _insisted_ on giving the agency an entire bushel of apples. “Consider it an edible tip!” the orchardist chirped as they shoved the heavy basket into Dirk’s arms and waved a cheery goodbye. 

Dirk, apparently suspicious of possessing any food so healthy in so large a quantity, immediately passed the basket to Todd, who took one look at it, sighed, and foisted it on Farah, as if to say “out of the three of us, you’re the most likely to know how to deal with forty pounds of apples.” 

And so Farah sorted through the entire bushel, conscientiously consulting the Washington Apple Commission website when she came across a variety she didn’t recognize. (Even unwanted tasks deserved to be done right.) In the end, she decided to keep only a few pounds of Jonagolds, Honeycrisps, and Mutsus, and she dropped off the remainder at the nearest food bank. After a quick detour to pick up extra butter and flour, she returned home, planted herself in front of her cookbook shelf, and began brainstorming.

In the following weeks, she perfected every variety of apple pie known to humankind, not to mention apple tarts, apple turnovers, applesauce gingerbread, baked apples, apple upside-down cake, an experimental apple clafoutis, and this afternoon’s baking venture, an apple sharlotka with a whiskey caramel sauce. _The_ whiskey caramel sauce. The one she hadn’t made since her birthday, when Tina had made certain... _suggestions_ regarding its potential for non-cake-related use. As she whisked the sauce to smoothness, Farah internally arm-wrestled her own embarrassment at making such a corny, obvious come-on. A come-on to her _partner_ , who she _lived_ with, and thus surely didn’t need to lure in via confectionaries? Unless — maybe the come-on only felt obvious to _her_. Maybe Tina would have no memory of a casual, throwaway innuendo from six months earlier, wouldn’t realize just how many heated daydreams it had sparked for Farah, wouldn’t even _notice_ the sauce in question. Maybe Farah was just getting weird and overly intense about baked goods. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Still, Farah felt a frisson of anticipation when Tina wafted into the kitchen the way she often did when Farah was baking, as if her nose had guided her there independently of her brain. Farah scraped the caramel out of its saucepan and into a jar as Tina paused to examine the sharlotka, cooling on a wire rack near the open window, its bright, fruity scent mingling with the aroma of damp earth carried in on the chilly October breeze. 

“New recipe?” she asked.

“Mm-hmm. Apple sharlotka.”

“It smells…” Tina inhaled deeply. “Well, it smells freaking incredible, obviously. But there’s something…” She narrowed her eyes. “Did you bake anything _else_ today?”

“No, I…” Farah was an accomplished and intimidating person, and she would _not_ get flustered over a dessert. “...well, the recipe called for a whiskey caramel sauce.” As if the statement needed proof, Farah gestured to the jar of sauce on the kitchen countertop behind her. 

Tina’s eyes went from narrow and confused to wide and delighted in less than a second. 

“Ohhhhhhhh,” she said, drawing out the syllable and stepping into Farah’s personal space. Farah shivered, feeling foolish but nonetheless thrilled.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d remember.”

Tina clasped a hand to her heart, mock-offended, then broke into a smile. “Yeah, that’s fair, the ol’ memory is, y’know — “ she wobbled the hand in a _so-so_ gesture. “But when it comes to this whole caramel sauce situation? Yeah, no. Not forgetting _that_ anytime soon. I said I could find, what — _five_ better uses for it than eating it with cake?”

Farah swallowed and turned back to the counter, where the jar of sauce was now cool enough to touch. “I think it was seven, actually, “ she said over her shoulder. “And if you found it so... _memorable_ , why didn’t you just ask me to make it earlier?”

“Nah, that would take the fun out of it. Plus, kinda rude, demanding you cook for me.” Tina crowded closer, pressing her front against Farah’s back and reaching for the jar. “Can I…?”

Farah nodded, deliciously unsure what would happen next, but certain that this was what she’d been wanting for _months_.

She hadn’t really known, before taking up with Tina, that uncertainty could be enjoyable, or exciting, or _anything_ other than a morass of grim, anxious dread that had to be tamped down and pushed out of sight. Just showing up in the world as herself required Farah to be constantly on guard, and her work — first the military, then private security, and now the detective agency — necessitated a certain degree of practical wariness. She couldn’t turn off her hypervigilance, but she’d been learning how to blunt its edges, and Tina played a large role in that process. Because as much as Tina’s unpredictability could be an epic pain in the ass, it was an unpredictability that Farah could relax into, rather than guard against. She could trust that Tina’s surprises would be exasperating at worst, amusing on average, and mind-blowing at best. (She hoping that whatever was about to happen would fall into the latter category.) 

There was clear, lascivious intent in Tina’s sidelong glance as she dipped two fingers into the jar, lifting them out with a swirl so that the ribbons of caramel twined around her knuckles. Farah’s mouth watered just at the _sight_ of it.

“Have you tasted it yet?” Tina asked.

Farah shook her head. “No. I was waiting for it to cool off.”

“Oh, was it _too hot_?” Tina was trying for sultry, but Farah could hear the barely repressed playfulness underneath. 

Still, Farah did her best to play along. “Maybe we should find out.” 

Tina wrapped her free arm around Farah’s waist, pulling their bodies flush against one another. “You first,” she said, and brought her caramel-covered fingers to Farah’s lips. 

Her touch was tentative (or at least tentative for Tina, whose sexual exuberance usually resulted in a more _full steam ahead_ approach), painting the sauce onto Farah’s lips and then pulling her fingers just out of reach, so that Farah’s tongue only brushed them as she licked away the caramel. The initial bloom of sweetness on Farah’s palate soon gave way to the mellower taste of vanilla, the richness of butter and bourbon. Even amidst the gathering fog of lust, Farah felt proud that _she’d_ made this. She wanted more — and not just of the caramel. She leaned forward and delicately licked Tina’s fingers until Tina let out a soft, low groan. 

The sound was both intimate and obscene, especially in the unusual setting of the kitchen, and for Farah, it was a call to decisive action. She seized Tina’s wrist and swiftly, deliberately sucked the caramel-coated fingers into her mouth. 

Tina groaned again, louder, as Farah cleaned both fingers down to the lowest knuckle, sliding them in and out of her mouth until the flavor of caramel gave way to the familiar, soap-and-salt taste of Tina’s skin. Farah had always had…not exactly a _kink_ for hands, but an _interest_. Her nearly comprehensive knowledge of the ways in which hands could be used as weapons gave her a particular appreciation for the trusting surrender of this act. When Tina finally withdrew her wet fingers to return them to the jar, they were both breathing faster, and their hips were locked together in a slow, tantalizing grind. Before removing her fingers from the jar, Tina used her clean hand to untie Farah’s apron and unbutton her shirt, letting the one drop to the floor and the other fall open, baring Farah’s chest and belly to the autumn air. Farah felt Tina’s lips — and _oh_ , her teeth — dropping kisses along her neck and shoulder, eliciting a wave of goosebumps that left Farah’s skin burning and her nipples tight against the practical cotton of her bra. She closed her eyes and reached back to clutch at Tina’s hair in encouragement — only to be startled by the sudden, sticky slide of caramel on her skin. She opened her eyes to discover that Tina had left fast, sloppy swipes of caramel along each of her collarbones, as well as one right down her sternum. The bra was a write-off now, caramel sauce already dripping into the bridge.

Farah let go of Tina’s hair with an indignant squeak and spun around to face her.

“Ooops?” Tina offered with a crooked grin. “Let me get that for you.” 

Before Farah had time to respond, Tina applied her tongue to the streaks with such single-mindedness than Farah didn’t know whether to moan or laugh. Tina was certainly smiling as she licked along Farah’s sternum in long, sweeping stripes. Farah let herself melt back against the counter, just a little bit. It was tempting to get lost in the alternating sensations of warm caramel, hot tongue, and cool damp skin, but she refused to let the stimulation distract her from sneakily returning the favor. She leaned even further back, twisting her arms so that the jar was within reach behind her, and waited until Tina was thoroughly occupied with mouthing the last traces of caramel from her collarbone. It was the perfect opening to Farah to clap two firm caramel handprints against the backs of Tina’s thighs, just underneath the hem of her lazy-weekend sweatshorts. 

Tina’s reaction, when it arrived, wasn’t so much surprised as it was confused. “What the fuck?” she murmured against Farah’s shoulder, and Farah’s laughter bubbled over, uncontainable. 

Once Tina realized she’d been caramel-groped, there was no turning back: the battle was on. All pretense of being smooth or seductive gave way to a petty, breathless bout of one-upmanship as they each tried to wrest the jar from the other, pulling off each other’s clothes as they went and smearing caramel everywhere they could reach. 

“Careful, that tickles — “

“Oh, sweet merciful mother of — _do that again_ — “

“Don’t you _dare_ get than in my hair — “

“Did you just write your _initials_ on my ass?”

“Your ass _is_ pretty fab.”

By the time the empty jar clattered to the floor, they’d drizzled, licked, smeared, and sucked until they were both panting from laugher and anticipation. Tina, naked now but for her slouchy socks, pinned Farah against the counter to finally, properly kiss her, and Farah abruptly remembered that they were _in the kitchen,_ where they cooked and ate and generally did things that didn’t involve genital contact. 

“This is — _god_ — this is highly unsanitary,” she said as Tina began to nibble kisses along her jaw. 

“Is that,” Tina asked between kisses, “a dealbreaker for you, or...?”

Farah emphasized just how much of a dealbreaker it wasn’t by scratching her fingernails up the small of Tina’s back. 

“ _Mmmmm_ , that’s good,” said Tina, arching against her, “because I think the window for declaring this too messy closed right around the time you licked caramel sauce out of my belly button.”

Farah huffed out another laugh, wriggling out of Tina’s grasp to snag a clean tea towel from the oven handle and spread it out on the flour-dusted, caramel-spattered counter. Then she very determinedly did _not_ think about how she must look — shirt half-off, jeans discarded, underwear dangling around one ankle — as she hoisted herself up to sit on the towel. Aesthetics weren’t important when she had Tina pushing her thighs open and surging back in to kiss her with renewed hunger.

The towel provided a welcome a barrier between the cool countertop and her bare legs as their kisses deepened, turning slow and intoxicating. The remaining caramel on their skin was growing tacky and clingy now, and by all rights it should’ve been uncomfortable, maybe even a little gross — the Farah from couple of years ago wouldn’t have tolerated it for more than a few minutes. But _this_ Farah had been turned inside out by the universe, and now she wasn’t _quite_ so prone to getting bogged down in minutiae...at least not when Tina was doing _that_ with her tongue. In fact, she needed Tina to do _that_ some more, to go faster, to move in closer. Lingering kisses and wandering hands were all well and good, but they’d gone on long enough as far as Farah was concerned. Her desire had been simmering on a back-burner for hours, for _months_ , and now, stoked by her fevered imaginings and the prolonged tease of the caramel fight, it was coming to a full boil. She could feel her heartbeat thudding, not only in her chest, but also in her ears, her belly, and between her legs, where she was already wet and aching.

She broke the kiss and dragged in a breath so she could urge Tina to _come on already,_ but the breath turned into a gasp as Tina pulled off Farah’s ruined, unclasped bra and rolled one taut nipple between the sticky fingers of her left hand.

Though this wasn’t _quite_ what she’d been hoping for, Farah still had to bite back a yelp as Tina applied her talented mouth to the other nipple, tweaking and sucking in concert until a fine sweat broke out along Farah’s hairline. The onslaught of stimulation could have been too much under different circumstances, but in this moment it had a curious diffusing effect, each pinch of her hardening nipples sending minute shivers down her back and tingling right down to her fingers and toes. (Probably due to increased bloodflow in her too-tense muscles — why hadn’t she thought to _stretch_ before tempting Tina into impromptu kitchen sex?) The closeness of their bodies created a pocket of warmth in the cool kitchen which, when combined with the late-afternoon sunlight, the heady scent of caramel, and the decadent thrum of arousal, left Farah feeling submerged, surrounded on all sides by sensation.

Then Tina’s right hand, which was miraculously still clean (did Tina save up her forethought for use in sexual situations only?) slid southwards, and Farah’s senses sharpened all at once, snapping her attention back to the throbbing pulse between her legs. Tina removed her mouth from Farah’s breast and returned her gaze to Farah’s face as she paused, the heel of her hand pressed firmly above Farah’s clit, fingers lightly brushing her vulva. 

“You want it like this?” she asked.

“ _Yes_ ,” Farah rasped in reply, already straining to meet Tina’s hand. 

The word had barely left Farah’s lips when Tina’s fingers parted her labia, and Tina cursed softly at the slickness she found inside. She stroked lightly around Farah’s entrance, just barely dipping inside before sliding her now-slippery fingers back up circle Farah’s clit, which was already so sensitive that Farah nearly shouted at the bright spike of pleasure. Farah hoped that this move meant they were finally getting down to business, but Tina dodged her expectations yet again, continuing to stroke Farah's clit at a leisurely pace, with occasional detours downward into shallow, teasing almost-thrusts that never turned into the deep slide and stretch that Farah wanted. It was so like Tina to turn an ill-advised quickie in the kitchen into a silly, passionate, drawn-out interlude that Farah’s frustration was tempered by a fresh burst of fondness for this improbable woman who shook her up, drew her out, and cheerfully ruined her unspoken plans.

Beneath the fondness, though, there was a near-painful need to feel Tina inside her. Choosing the most direct approach, Farah used her own hand to guide Tina’s where she wanted it, but once again, Tina hesitated. 

“Like this?” she asked, pressing in with just the tips of two fingers. 

Farah nodded fervently, trying to hurry things along, but Tina wasn’t having it. “C’mon,” she said, voice low and eyes sparkling. “You know I like to hear you say it.”

Farah whined, high in the back of her throat, and gripped Tina by the shoulders. 

“Tina,” she said, looking her square in the eyes. “I want — I _need_ you to fuck me. Right here, on this kitchen counter. _Now_. Please.” Tina stared at her for a half-second, unmoving except for the widening of her eyes. Then she swallowed, shifted her stance, and finally, _finally_ pushed her fingers in as deep as they’d go. 

Farah moaned and threw her head back as Tina’s fingers slid home, relishing the rare exhilaration of abandon. She clutched the edge of the counter with both hands and tilted her tailbone forward to meet Tina’s deep, unsteady thrusts. The height of the counter meant that Tina’s arm was at a slightly awkward angle, but she was giving it her all nonetheless, and Farah was _profoundly_ grateful. She was even more grateful when Tina sank three fingers inside her and crooked them upwards, flexing them in that way that always made Farah feel like her spine had turned into liquid butter. She let her hips undulate a few times, luxuriating in the shifting friction and fullness. Then Tina hit _just_ the right angle, and Farah grabbed her hand to hold it in place, grinding down against it and biting her own lip.

“Don’t — “ Tina took Farah’s lower lip between her own, coaxing it out from under her teeth. “I want to hear you.”

“ _Mmmmmmph_ ,” was the only sound Farah could make, and though it sounded loud and inelegant to her, it provoked a triumphant quirk of Tina’s lips and a strategic curl of Tina’s fingers. Farah released her hand, and Tina began a faster, more driving rhythm, pulling almost all the way out on every thrust, stimulating the nerve endings of Farah’s entrance as well as the ones deeper inside. Farah began rolling her hips in counterpoint, letting the momentum build up between them, and when Tina twisted her hand so that her thumb rubbed against Farah’s clit with every stroke, Farah let out a high-pitched whimper.

“Yeah? Is that it?” Tina panted into her ear, giving the lobe a nip which zinged through Farah’s system, ratcheting her arousal even higher. 

“Godddd, yes, _yes_ , that’s it, _please_ don’t stop — “

Tina didn’t stop, not the thrusts or the almost-too-much pressure on Farah’s clit. “Yeah, come on, _c’mon_ , you’re so — you’re so fucking _good_ , so perfect like this, spread open on the counter for me —”

Farah felt a flush at her words, which only added to the heat building in her abdomen. Tina knew _exactly_ what she was saying, and what it was doing to Farah. There had been a bit of a learning curve in that area when they first started having sex, and it had taken a while for them to find a middle ground between Tina’s gleefully vulgar pillow talk and Farah’s actions-speak-louder-than-words approach. Although Farah didn’t _need_ external validation nearly as much as she used to, she still _craved_ it, and Tina was more than happy to feed that craving until Farah practically glowed. Farah wasn’t sure she could handle any more intensity right now, so she took one hand off the counter to bury it in Tina’s hair, pulling her close for a messy kiss. But a kiss wasn’t enough to stop Tina talking. 

“God _damn_ , just look at you, you’re doing _so good_. Are you gonna come for me? I bet you’re about to come, and I wanna watch you do it, want to feel you — can _already_ feel you getting tighter.”

And she was, her internal muscles beginning to contract as she hit that breathtaking moment just before orgasm when her whole body felt full to brimming, trembling with surface tension, until finally it broke free and overflowed. 

Farah came with a soundless cry, mouth wide open and fingers still tangled in Tina’s hair. Tina gentled the movement of her hand, but kept going until Farah gripped her wrist again, stopping her before pleasure turned to overstimulation. In the floaty, post-orgasmic high, Farah felt Tina’s hand ease free, felt herself slipping off the counter and letting Tina hold her steady through the gradual comedown. When she recovered enough for her awareness to return, Farah realized that Tina was kissing her shoulder and...chuckling?

“Is...something funny?” Laughing during sex was pretty typical for Tina (another thing that had been new and lowkey revelatory for Farah), but in this instance Farah was worried that she’d missed something.

Tina just grinned at her. “It _kills_ me the way you always say ‘please’ even when you’re being bossy about sex things,” she replied. “For reals, that’s what you should put on my tombstone: _Here lies Tina Tamara Tevetino, murdered in her prime by Farah Black politely demanding to be fucked_.”

Farah didn’t see what was so funny about good manners in bed (or on the kitchen counter), but at the moment, she didn’t have it in her to care. What she _did_ have was her coordination back, as well as an increasingly urgent need to get her hands on Tina. 

Only... _well_. Farah didn’t want to interrupt the proceedings to give her caramel-stained hands a surgical scrub, but as things were, she could only put her hands _on_ Tina, not _in_ Tina — there was nothing sexy about giving your partner an infection from sugar in places where sugar shouldn’t be. 

So, no hands. She could work with that.

Tina’s eyebrows drew inwards. “You have thinking face. You just came _,_ like, _two seconds_ ago, _how_ can you possibly be thinking so har —”

Straightening up out of her slouch, Farah grabbed Tina’s hips, cutting her off mid-sentence, and reversed their positions with brisk efficiency. (Krav maga training was, occasionally, useful for things other than fighting.) To Tina’s credit, she barely even seemed surprised, merely a bit winded — until Farah dropped to her knees, and Tina seemed to stop breathing entirely.

“Think you can help me do this hands-free?” Farah asked, looking up at Tina with the barest hint of a smirk.

“Oh _fuck_ yeah,” Tina replied, her words running together in her haste to answer.

After a brief pause to repurpose her own jeans into a cushion (no matter how turned on she might be, she still had the knees of a runner in her mid-thirties), Farah turned her full attention to Tina — or at least the parts of Tina she could reach from her current position. She ruffled the short hair on Tina’s ticklish shins, smiling at Tina’s quiet bark of laughter, and moved back up to to thumb along each hip bone and reverently lick at the creases between hip and thigh. Tina made a noise that was somewhere between a sigh and a moan, and _god_ , no matter how many times they did this, Farah still marveled at how unabashed Tina was, how unselfconsciously _present_ in her own pleasure. She never held back, never cared if she was loud or crass; right now, she seemed utterly unbothered about how wanton she looked, naked and smeared with caramel, reaching down with her right hand to hold herself open for Farah. 

She was gratifyingly aroused already, her clit standing up flushed and firm, and Farah couldn’t resist giving it a fleeting, feather-light flick of her tongue. Tina’s breath hitched, and Farah moved downward, softly licking Tina’s inner folds and savoring her musky-sharp taste — a welcome contrast after so much sugary sweetness. Farah hummed with satisfaction, trying to let Tina hear her. 

“That feels — oh, _fuck_ — this isn’t gonna take very long,” said Tina. Farah responded by kneading and nudging her thighs with both hands, adjusting the angle of her pelvis so that Farah could tongue at her entrance. In only a few seconds Tina was squirming, trying to get Farah to return her attention to an area just a little bit higher. “I need — can you, my clit, like you did before? I’m _so close…_ ” 

Instead of doing as Tina asked, Farah — who was not above a bit of payback — pulled back to look up at her, eyebrows raised in expectation. Tina looked confused at first, but then understanding dawned. 

“Seriously? _”_

Farah didn’t answer her with words, but simply leaned forward, without breaking eye contact, and exhaled a hot breath directly over Tina’s clit — _without_ actually touching it.

Tina grunted and clawed at the countertop with her free hand. “Ohhh, god _damn_ ….fine, okay? You win, just — _pleeeeeease_ ,” she begged, desperation dripping from the elongated syllable. 

Satisfied, Farah relented, lavishing Tina’s clit with wet, swirling pressure. They were both moaning now, Tina having lost her ability even to babble, and soon Farah felt Tina’s hand clamp down on her shoulder as her muscles clenched and she came with a hoarse shout.

Farah held onto Tina's thighs through the aftershocks, waiting until Tina melted against the counter before she wiped her mouth with the back of her wrist and gently removed Tina’s hand from her shoulder. Tina gave a long, relieved exhale, looking down at Farah with what could only be described as adoration. When Farah stood up, Tina wasted no time pulling her into a kiss, which she only broke to whisper in Farah’s ear. Farah brushed back the flyaway strands of Tina’s hair and whispered the same words back to her, offering them up like they cost nothing, even though both she and Tina knew how hard-won they were. 

“Soooo, bedroom now?” Tina asked, still half-whispering. “Round two?” 

Farah nodded into Tina’s neck. “But showering first.”

“Yeah, good, showering — hot, slippery, full use of our hands. I’m in.”

Farah took Tina’s hand and pulled her away toward the bedroom, abandoning the misused tea towel, piles of clothing, and splatters of caramel sauce to the sunset-streaked quiet of the kitchen. The mess could wait until tomorrow.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, and if you enjoyed this, please let me know!
> 
> This absurdly soft culinary smut marks my two-year fandom-versary and my one-year fic-versary. Before I found DGHDA, I never thought I’d write fanfic, and I was afraid that I’d never feel passionate about a new fandom again. I’m delighted to have been proven wrong on both counts.
> 
> Here’s the [recipe for apple sharlotka](https://www.goodfood.com.au/recipes/russian-apple-cake-with-whisky-toffee-sauce-20170512-gw3dup), and the [ apple guide](https://bestapples.com/varieties-information/varieties/) from the Washington Apple Commission, an organization that surely never anticipated being mentioned in amateur internet erotica.


End file.
